


Thunderstorms Instead of Blood

by marauders_groupie



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: (buckets of it let's be real), Alternate Universe - Car Racing, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst, F/M, Girl Power, Racing, Sexual Tension, Smut
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-28
Updated: 2016-02-28
Packaged: 2018-05-23 19:54:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 15,922
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6128323
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/marauders_groupie/pseuds/marauders_groupie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A Bellarke car racing AU.</p><p>*</p><p>  <i>It goes like this:</i></p><p>  <i>Nothing in the world except for the two of them. Haphazardly thrown smirks, the smell of gasoline and burning rubber. A 1974 Pontiac Firebird – phoenix rising from the ashes of the asphalt. An electric blue 1969 Camaro whose electricity coils up the air, overflowing with tension.</i></p><p>  <i>Nothing in the world except for Bellamy and Clarke, their cars and a vast racetrack in front of them that feels like a promise of victory.</i></p><p>  <i>Gasoline has always tasted better than water and their hearts don’t beat – they thrum in rhythm to their engines.</i></p><p>  <i>That’s the way it has always been. That’s the way it always will be. Go out in a pyre of glory or don’t come at all.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	Thunderstorms Instead of Blood

**Author's Note:**

> The first thing I have to say is - [Nat](http://archiveofourown.org/users/alltheworldsinmyhead), thank you. If it hadn't been for you, I wouldn't have finished this. Thank you for listening to my headcanons and adding yours, thank you for the lovely phrases "laugh that could stop wars" and "a marble statue" in correlation to Clarke, and thank you for being this fic's peppiest cheerleader. I love you so much.  
> Seriously, you should absolutely thank Nat for this happening and check out her fics because they are a work of art. Trust me.  
> Also, this is a shoutout to my Grease AU because, apparently, a lot of us have a kink for Bellarke and cars. This is why this happened.
> 
> This fic won't be full of technical terms, but there is one that is frequently mentioned: _injecting nitrous oxide into a car_. It basically means that more oxygen is available during internal combustion and therefore, more fuel can be injected so the engine produces more power.
> 
> The title is from a quote in Gabriel Gadfly's Supercell - "My heart has always beat thunderstorms instead of blood."
> 
> Enjoy!

Their story begins with gasoline and the thrill of the race and it ends with terror and collision, flames licking at their feet, because people like them love life only when it’s thrashing a march against their ribs and making them work for the sweet taste of adrenaline.

But it’s always the gasoline, sticking to Bellamy’s skin one night in July when heat is coming off the asphalt of the racetrack in blistering waves, the sweet smell of it never leaving his skin. He can never wash it away, like he can’t forget the taste.

Some days, he thinks that racing has entered his bloodstream and he hasn’t so much made it his, as racing has made Bellamy _its_.

Cheers echo around him as he leans on the hood of his Camaro, Miller patting him on the shoulder with a stern face.

“You take too many risks, man.”

“God, Miller, live a little,” Bellamy shoots back, raising an eyebrow at a girl who walks past him, wishing him luck. She’s beautiful, all of them are, and for some reason they want him. He never complains, just gives them what they expect out of him – the same flames that are burning, painted on the side of his car, to burn in his body and set them ablaze.

But summer is the worst in these parts, heat making people crazy with inexplicable want. For what? No one knows. They all just feel that particular itch of frustration simmering underneath their skin.

Bellamy has found a way to scratch it and if it’s by throwing himself into an electric blue Camaro and pressing the accelerator until he can’t feel anything but the grip he’s got on the steering wheel, so be it.

Everyone’s dying for some control in this chaotic world and he’s found his somewhere between the engine exploding to life and roaring towards the finish line.

“You’re living too much these days, Blake. There are people who care about you.”

A smile stretches Bellamy’s lips, always coming easier when he’s on the track. He feels young and like the weight has been lifted off his shoulders in those short few minutes he spends dizzy with adrenaline.

“You going sappy on me?”

Miller rolls his eyes, exasperated. “I’m just saying – there’s probably someone who cares. Not me, though.”

Raven’s voice cuts through the standstill that has Bellamy thinking of Octavia, standing on the sidelines and jittering with the same restless energy that is now creeping into his body.

“Alright, assholes, get up here!”

Nothing matters after Bellamy approaches the starting line, Raven grinning at him because she knows his car inside and out, that blue Camaro she’s poured her heart and soul into fixing. She’s grease and car oil stains, sharp smiles and Bellamy probably likes her jabs too much.

“Got up on the wrong side of the bed, Raven?” he provokes. Raven flips him off and nearly drops the checkered flag.

“Fuck off, Blake, and keep your eyes on your steering wheel.”

A horn blows and then they’re off. Jasper, in his orange Nissan Skyline that should be, by all accounts, faster than Bellamy’s Camaro, but he doesn’t have a supercharger and Bellamy lets him eat his dust. Jasper Jordan is all about flash and bling, never giving a shit whether he wins or not.

Really, all of them are in it to enjoy the thrill of the ride, of dust rising in their wake, of feeling like they could ignite every single second but somehow never coming around to doing it.

Monroe is hot on Bellamy’s heels and he can’t see her face in the rearview but he can imagine how she’s baring her teeth as he switches into the third, car slowing down until it picks up again. He cuts the corner, laughing when he hears a hearty “Fuck you” from the rear, audible even with all the noise, and then there’s gasoline filling his nostrils as he speeds off.

The racetrack sprawls ahead, almost a smooth sail as he leans his arm out the window, takes a deep breath, takes it all in – the heat burning his lungs up, the sharp smell of fuel he can’t get out of his car, the thousands of stars in the night sky.

Bellamy can’t help feeling that they’re here for him. Even the stars paused for a second to see the Rebel King in his electric blue Camaro sailing down the track, like he doesn’t have a care in the world, his heart light in his chest.

And then –

A flicker of red in his side view mirror, like a spark, and Bellamy isn’t fast enough.

(He is _always_ fast enough.)

A red Pontiac Firebird smoothly overtakes him, the driver’s face obscured by a helmet.

“Fucking asshole,” he growls, switching into the fourth gear, engine sputtering, fifth and then he presses the accelerator again, just fucking floors it until he can almost reach the Pontiac’s rear end. “Yeah, you wait. Who the fuck – “

He’s nearly gotten to the door, the side of the car newly lacquered, when the Pontiac speeds up, faster than it should be possible and Bellamy hits the steering wheel with an open palm, feeling his muscles flex as the fucking asshole just vanishes ahead.

This has never happened before and the sheer audacity of the act sets blood boiling in Bellamy’s veins, his vision turning red like that fucking Pontiac that he’s trying to catch up to but it’s a battle already lost. Whoever’s driving it has to have had nitro injections because there is no way they’d be able to make all that rumble and get to that speed without it.

And he keeps staring at it, Monroe and Jasper catching up to him, equal confusion painted on their faces as they watch the Pontiac cross the finish line, end up right next to Raven with a forceful turn that makes its tires squeal.

Bellamy is there two seconds later, not bothering to shut the engine down before he’s throwing himself out of his car, slamming the door and all but running towards the Pontiac. Raven is leaning into it, talking to whoever’s in there and Bellamy is vaguely aware of Miller trying to restrain him but he doesn’t let him.

“I’m going to fuck you up!” His voice echoes across the racetrack. The first lights have been turned on and the brightest illuminates the hood of the Pontiac, turning it into a phoenix that leaves Bellamy in its ashes.

Raven turns to look at him, calculating.

“Blake – “

“No, Miller, fucking let me go,” he hisses, ripping his arm out of his best friend’s grip as he makes his way towards the car, the driver still inside. “Out – fucking – side! Let’s go!”

Raven flinches when he slams his palm on the spoiler of the Pontiac, one hand already reaching for the handle and nearly slipping when the door creaks open.

There’s a second of unbearable tension, a crowd already gathered next to them but Bellamy’s tunnel vision catches nothing except for the inside of the car, the driver dressed in black leather and with a black visor on their helmet.

The drives is shorter than Bellamy and lean, probably fitting his sports car perfectly, but he gets out, slams the door behind him.

“Not my fault you don’t know how to drive.”

Bellamy freezes in his tracks, hands fisted by his sides and feeling the fury that’s probably burn the hell out of him flaring inside him.

_Who the fuck -_

“You wanna fucking go?”

And then the driver’s hands reach towards his helmet, a second in which Bellamy’s brain short-circuits.

The first thing Bellamy sees is miles of gold, reflecting underneath the yellow light, burning in his eyes when the driver takes off his helmet.

And then – a smirk. A smirk on the _girl_ ’s face, like she’s aware that she’s wiped the floor with him and can’t possibly love it more. Her helmet fits in the crook of her arm perfectly as she smirks at him.

“Yeah,” she confirms, her voice husky as she eyes him, up and down, making him feel naked and fucking hating her for it. “Yeah, I wanna go if you’re ready to get beaten again.”

She’s beautiful and he fucking hates her.

“Who the fuck are you?” is what comes out instead of anything else because it’s like someone’s poured ice cold water on Bellamy, extinguished the fire and now he’s just left feeling bitter and pissed off.

The girl’s lips widen again, eyes as blue and crackling with electricity as his own Camaro, and she says, “Clarke. I’d say it’s nice to meet you, but.” Another grin. “It’s nice to beat you.”

Jesus Christ, she’s shorter than him and it still feels like she’s looking down at him, with unparalleled superiority that reduces him to crumbs under her stare.

“I don’t give a shit, you fucking cheated!”

The girl – Clarke, he corrects himself, of course, sounds like she’s fucking royalty – scoffs. “Cheated? Please, enlighten me.”

“You weren’t even at the starting line!”

The world starts returning to him, bit by bit. He becomes aware of Octavia idling by his side, Miller looking like he’s getting ready to hold him back, the crowd that’s gathered there encircling them and itching for a fight.

Well, he’s not gonna give them one.

“You know what? Fuck it.” Bellamy waves his hand dismissively. “You’re no one.”

Clarke looks at him like he’s a kid throwing a tantrum and he doesn’t know if he wants to make her engine grenade or fuck her, but every option makes him feel like he’s two seconds from explode and taking her down with him.

“And you’re the Rebel King,” she says finally, calm.

Bellamy’s just about to leave, half on his way to turn around and go get drunk with Lincoln, Octavia and Miller, when Raven’s words stop him.

“Technically – you’re the queen now, Clarke. You won the race.”

Electricity overflows the air as everyone quietens down, the only audible thing being Bellamy’s sharp intake of breath.

“What did you just say?”

“I said,” Raven counters, raising her jaw petulantly with her hands in the pockets of her red bomber jacket, “that she’s the champ now. She beat you, Blake.” Then she turns towards Clarke with a brilliant grin the other girl returns. “I knew you’d win, Clarke.”

The dots connect in Bellamy’s mind; how Clarke knew just when to swoop in, how fast her Pontiac was going, how she left him trailing behind her like he’s not the king of this track, but a fucking pawn. The grins, the talks.

The dots connect, form a constellation, and every single star is fucking collapsing in flames inside Bellamy.

His voice is dripping with venom when he presses out, “She’s one of _yours_?”

“Hell yeah, she’s one of mine. Haven’t you seen her drive?”

“I’ve seen that _asshole_ swoop in before the finish line and beat me to it – “

Raven’s at his throat in a second, a switchblade pulled out of her boot and flames flickering in her eyes as she presses the cool metal to his collarbone.

“Clarke is my girl. If you have a problem with her, you’ve got a problem with me, too. And I take care of your engine, so I’d be real fucking _careful_.”

Bellamy swallows, hard, before Octavia tugs on Raven’s arm, shakes her head a little like she’s begging her to give up. The mechanic shrugs, shoots Bellamy another glare and sheathes her switchblade, moving away.

“Play nice. Or don’t play at all, I don’t give a shit.”

Oh, he’s gonna fucking play alright.

“I want a rematch.”

Raven grins, sharp as the edge of her blade, and he knows it’s on.

 

*

 

Clarke knows one thing:

No one does it if they don’t secretly want to destroy themselves.

Behind the sharp smiles, smirks dripping with superiority and nostrils flaring when they sense asphalt mixing with gasoline in the air, there is disgust, there is desperation and there is a need to do anything that sets a calm in their tumultuous souls.

But they don’t talk about it. Raven downs her whiskey sour, licks her lips and fakes satisfaction when she looks at Clarke and says,

“I knew you’d win.”

And Clarke is no longer a girl who can’t take the glass panels in her apartment and how she reflects in them, no longer a girl whose shoulders slump under all that weight she doesn’t know how to name.

No, she is queen victorious now and for that, she grins back, forgets about the bitter aftertaste life left in her mouth. She has destroyed herself, reduced who she was to ruins, and from them she rises behind the wheel of her dad’s Pontiac.

The bar Raven takes her to after the race is crowded, smells of smoke and beer, loud rock music playing in sync with Clarke’s own heart. Adrenaline is still webbing across her body, the pulse that has grown more rapid after the race, after meeting the Rebel King who she knew she’d want to beat as soon as Raven told her.

There is something about winning that she can’t get enough of.

And he was cocky, so self-assured and walking like he owns the metaphorical crown. He demanded to see her, demanded explanations, every muscle in his body taut as if trying to restrain himself from catching fire.

All because of Clarke.

“I wasn’t going to disappoint you,” Clarke replies, downing what’s left of her own whiskey and cringing at the thought. Somewhere further away, Monroe laughs at something Harper said.

“So, how’d you like it? Really gets your blood _racing_ , doesn’t it?”

“You knew I’d love it as soon as you saw me.”

Raven grins. “Hell yeah! You walked in, wearing that fancy suit and looking like you hate it. And you looked like you’d devour your Pontiac.”

“It felt good.”

It felt like Clarke was, for the first time in her life, in control of something. In control of how soon she’ll let go of the clutch, how fast and how hard she’ll press the accelerator.

She looks over at Raven, looking smug for her words, and thinks back to the day she saw her in the garage, after everything that has happened with Finn, to Raven explaining why she can’t race anymore. The brace she has strapped to her leg is a living reminder of how dangerous it can become to do what they do.

But Clarke doesn’t back down. Her laugh gets louder as the night passes, the girls’ heads thrown back in it, beer overflowing their glasses and she’s happy. It should be so violent and so angry, but she’s happy.

In the days that follow, Raven makes sure that Clarke’s Pontiac is up to the challenge of the rematch and Clarke carries the secret of what she does once a week in her heart like a treasured possession. Her colleagues can’t disappoint her anymore, no glance thrown in her direction with an off-hand comment of “her mother bought the job for her” can touch her, not now.

Now, she has a secret that makes her heart swell in her chest, threatening to rip at the seams.

She’s itching for a race by the time Friday comes around, pacing restlessly around her apartment until her phone pings with Raven’s text.

 _Get your ass outside_.

You’d have thought someone had set Clarke on fire with how fast she grabs her jacket, all but flying down the stairs separating her from where her Pontiac and her Raven will reside. It feels like both of them are Clarke’s, in a way that meant they anchor her to the ground.

For a long time, it felt as if she’d been drifting through this world, untethered, but now she has a smiling Raven leaning on the hood of her car and beaming when Clarke throws herself inside with more ferocity than what was probably necessary.

She’s missed it, the leather on the seats, squeaking against the leather of her jacket, her hands automatically fitting to the wheel and her knee jiggling until she can press on the clutch.

Then she turns over the engine and it’s like there’s a symphony in her head, dispelling every fear she’s ever had.

“I fixed your brakes, changed your tires – you burned them real good last time, made sure ABS is still untouched,” Raven rattles off, looking around the car to point out what else she’s done but Clarke doesn’t hear her.

Nothing goes past the thrumming of the engine, soothing her instantly.

“Fucking ungrateful,” Raven mutters at last. “I’m fixing all of your goddamn cars and you don’t even have the decency to – “

“Raven. Thank you.”

Raven blinks at her. The sun sets on her cheek, dripping red and orange and gold. “You’re welcome.”

Clarke hums contentedly, takes off her leg just a little off the clutch, shifts into the first gear. The engine never stops singing.

“Alright. And now, let’s go raise hell.”

Raven grins and in that moment, Clarke knows that they are too powerful to ever be conquered.

Monroe and Harper are waiting them on the corner of Harper’s building, matching pink jackets Octavia secretly made for them and Raven swears on her favorite wrench that Clarke will get one. Their cheeks pink prettily when they’re caught making out under a neon sign, all fervent hands and little sighs that seem so unusual for the secret lives they lead, but.

“Alright, lovebirds, get in!” Raven yells through the window, voice like gravel that rasps across Clarke’s skin.

“You’re an asshole, you know that, Reyes?” Monroe hisses as she helps Harper in. The latter girl laughs at her girlfriend’s antics, leans her chin on Clarke’s seat.

“Where to, Clarke?”

The night has a buzz to it, setting the pace to their ride. Clarke keeps her eyes on the road in front of her, lights flashing across the pavement, puddles full of neon and no shadows, like the city won’t let them keep their secrets.

But these girls are keeping theirs.

They are loud, triumphant, Harper kicking her legs a little against Clarke’s seat, Raven blasting the stereo when Violent Femmes’ Add It Up comes on, all four of them singing along with their voices echoing out onto the road.

She sees the glimmers of smiles in the backseat, feels Raven knocking her knee against Clarke’s, motioning for her to cheer up and relax.

No one knows how shaky her hands were the first time she sat behind the wheel of her car after her dad died, no one knows about the web of anxiety spreading through her body and feeling a panic attack come on with rapid heartbeats.

Now, her heart is beating rapidly because the night is young, thick with heat and laughter, an undercurrent of danger that has Clarke sitting on the edge of her seat, as if anything is possible.

All of them know that they could get hurt, but there is something about how liberating all of it is – from the smell of the leather to the combustion spurring the engine - and them – on, that makes it feel like they can’t be touched.

And even if they can, they are going to go out being free. The price of freedom is high, but it’s a cost Clarke’s willing to pay.

“Come on, Clarke, to the track!” Monroe commands from the backseat, her legs propped up in Harper’s lap as Raven rolls her eyes at them. “Let’s go watch you kick Blake’s ass again!”

“If you really, really want to – “ Clarke teases, catching Monroe’s eye in the rearview mirror.

“Yes, we definitely do! Let’s go!”

With that, Clarke sets off in the direction of the racetrack, feeling the familiar shivers running down her hands. The first time she drove there, she was a mess of nerves. And then – then she saw his blue Camaro, brighter than anything she’s ever seen, danger hidden in a pretty wrapper.

She had to beat him.

And she did.

When they make it to the track, Clarke pulls in right next to Blake’s car, careful not to scratch it. She may think he’s full of shit but his car is beautiful and it’d be a shame to ruin it.

They file out of her Pontiac, Raven casting one last longing glance at it for which Clarke teases her, gets a punch in the shoulder in return, and then it’s off to join the rest of the crowd gathered not far away.

Blake’s eyes are on her as soon as he spots her, gaze not quite predatory but not quite unthreatening, either. He’s the king and she’s heading straight for his crown. It’d be a lie to say that the thought doesn’t excite her, the idea of seeing anger flare in him like last week.

“Look at that, the princess has arrived,” he teases when she comes closer, trying for nonchalant and coming off as caring too much. Octavia pulls at the back of his black T-shirt, tight enough to follow the contour of his muscles.

“And the king looks ready to get overthrown,” she shoots back, watching his brow furrow. There’s something incredibly appealing about how she can make him squirm.

In a split second, he’s in front of her, so close his nose almost brushes hers. Every single nerve in her body is acutely aware of him that it feels like she might combust.

When he speaks, his breath is sizzling on her cheek, rumble of his voice low enough only for her to hear. “Has no one ever told you that you shouldn’t play with fire if you don’t want to get burned?”

Clarke should feel threatened but she doesn’t. Instead, she feels lucky enough to press herself against him, smirking when he flinches.

“Maybe I _want_ to.”

 A beat of silence, tension coiling around them like a snake, and then –

“Suit yourself.”

Blake steps away and it’s like there’s a pull towards him, towards his unruly, dark curls and face full of constellations, freckles, almost ridiculous when she knows that this man has been racing for five years now and probably relishes in every burn he gets.

Still, Clarke _wants_.

Wants to beat him. Wants to burn herself, wants to burn herself on _him_. It feels like they are two seconds from colliding and hell, they’d make a glorious atomic reaction.

Blake turns his back on her, his muscles rippling under his shirt as he spreads his arms at the gathering crowd. Clarke knows most of them, Raven made sure of that, and they all stop and stare.

“It’s one of his speeches,” Harper whispers, a tone of fond annoyance drifting into her voice. “He _loves_ those.”

But everyone else loves them, too, it would seem. Because, when Bellamy calls for attention, voice deep and echoing across the stands, no one even dares to exhale.

“Do you want to see me defeat the princess? She strides in here, doesn’t know shit about us and while she is fun, I’ll give her that,” he acknowledges her with an once-over, makes her feel like she’s nothing more than a pebble on the ground, “but you all know who’s the king, right?”

The question mark at the end of his sentence hangs heavy in the air and Clarke almost starts thinking like they’re going to cheer for her.

Jasper starts chanting first, “the Rebel King”, neat little intervals that only make sure Clarke knows that she has to win this one. The Rebel King, the Rebel King, and he laps it all up. He soaks up the attention and it only seems to inflate him so that, by the time he turns over to look at her, smirking, he looks bigger than the whole city.

“Well, if the people demand it,” he declares, his smirk widening into a grin that puts dimples in his cheeks. She’d have pegged him for someone who helped old ladies across the street, looking like that, if she didn’t know better.

Raven pulls her out of her thoughts, jostles her towards the Pontiac and ties her seatbelt.

“Burnout is your friend,” she instructs her, motioning towards the tires. Clarke nods, does as she’s been told. Raven explained earlier that it would improve the traction, make sure she doesn’t go flying off if she cuts a corner, but Clarke is doing it mechanically.

Her mind is still somewhere by Blake, who has thrown himself into his car. He does everything forcefully, with intent, and now his engine is making sure she knows it even if Miller’s back is obscuring the inside of the Camaro.

“You good to go, Griffin?”

It’s only then that Clarke snaps out of it, the world of red and speed she’s been stuck in. Raven is frowning at her, looking like she isn’t sure whether this was the best course of action.

“Yeah. I just have to win, right? Piece of cake.”

Raven chuckles darkly at that, her bracelet hitting the side mirror of Clarke’s Pontiac. “No. You don’t. But you’ll feel better if you do.”

With that, Clarke’s off to the starting line, the engine roaring as it combusts, thanks to Raven’s magic she calls the magic of nitrous oxide.

Blake races her even to the starting line but she’s not in a rush, cruising easily as the crowd moves away to the stands to watch. Octavia, Blake’s sister, is smiling at her and Clarke feels a wave of fondness for everyone she’s met here so far.

However, when she pulls up to Blake, his eyes are on her. It begins with electricity in her fingers, knuckles whiter as she grips the wheel, Raven’s smile as she passes them by to stand in front with a checkered flag. The tires screech as Clarke burns them on the unforgiving pavement.

The lights of Blake’s Camaro cast a shine on Raven’s brace, all metal, spite and resilience.

Clarke’s thumb skims over the stick shift, feels the thrumming against her skin. Blake bares his teeth at her in a feral grin, Clarke smirks in response, the air is thick with excitement and when Raven gives the sign, they shoot off.

The world stops when all she can see is the miles of asphalt in front of her, tunnel vision that catches only Blake in the rearview mirror. She is pure energy after she realizes that he’s toying with her, trying to get her to think she’s going to win.

But two can play that game, hasn’t he heard?

She slides into a corner, quick, precise turns of the wheel to keep herself in balance. There’s a flicker of blue in the corner of her eye when Blake overtakes her, but it’s not for long.

“Just give up, Princess, and I’ll go easy on you!” he shouts when she catches up, door to door. His smile is wider, a 100 watt one she never thought she’d see on him. It’s almost boyishly innocent.

“Never!”

There are dimples in his cheeks when he shakes his head, amused, and she sees the moment his hand reaches to shift into the next gear so she does the same.

They make it across the finish line together, just a piece of his hood in front of her, which makes him jump out of his car, kick the dirt and rise the dust, letting out a victorious shout.

Raven doesn’t look disappointed and Clarke doesn’t feel like it, either.

For the first time, it seems like more than control. It seems fun, how Blake throws her a smile, pats her on the back, joyous that he’s won.

“Fuck me, you’re good, Princess.”

It feels like a truce.

 

*

 

It goes on like that for a while. Bellamy returns home every night just before the dawn, unable to stop himself from smiling because the fucking Princess is so intent on beating him and he doesn’t even care.

He’s been racing ever since he was twenty, tired of being a fucking adult when he was supposed to be a kid, and it provided a good way to deal with all the frustration he felt after his mother died and he was left with a younger sister who seemed torn between wanting to help him and rebel.

Raven used to be good until her leg got crushed in an accident, a worthy opponent, but Clarke is different. Clarke smells like money, looks like a fucking princess, has a great car and infuriates him to the core.

Still –

“You like her, don’t you?” Octavia asks, waiting for him on the couch, a sleeping Lincoln curled up next to her. Bellamy can’t believe he used to hate him once when he’s the only one who can keep Octavia’s feet on the ground.

His car keys fall into the bowl by the door with a clatter. “Like who?”

“Clarke.”

Bellamy scoffs, settling down next to her, the couch too small for all three of them but they’re gonna try. He’s not sure why the two of them seem to live in his apartment these days, but it’s all the same. Between his bar and the racing, he’s not there a lot anyways.

There’s a flicker of danger in Octavia’s eyes, too much like their mother. Too much like Bellamy. “She challenges you and you eat it up.”

“I like some healthy competition, so what?”

“So you won’t be bothered if I join them?”

Bellamy chokes on thin air. “Excuse me?”

“Raven has a car, I wanna race, it’s a match made in heaven.”

“Seriously, O?”

Octavia shrugs, trying to pretend like she’s innocent when both of them know she’s been stealing his car since she was sixteen and thought he wouldn’t mind.

Now she’s ruder and has her own, which she keeps bugging Raven to tune up for her. But at least she hasn’t been racing regularly.

“That hurts, O. That really hurts. You’d just trade me for Raven’s team?”

They’re actually all on the same team, all for one and one against all, the lines have been blurred for a long time, but it still stings a little. Clarke, Raven, Monroe and Harper are a force of nature, all on their own.

“Badass girls with cars or wimpy guys who cry because they’ve lost their titles?” Octavia snorts. “Yeah, Bell, you’re my bro, but Raven’s gonna get me a pink jacket.”

“Traitor.”

“Asshole.”

“Have fun in hell.”

“I will. Clarke’s there,” Octavia shoots back, winking at him and Bellamy nudges her shoulder.

The next time they’re on the track, the girls are sitting by the stands, their legs propped up in each other’s laps, looking like heaven that’s gonna give you hell if you mess with them, and his baby sister is with them.

Monty laughs when he sees Bellamy’s face, leaning on Miller next to his old Honda Civic that’s been repaired more times than it’s actually worth.

“You’re losing followers, King.”

“Fuck off, Green,” Bellamy retorts, popping the hood of his Camaro and pretending like he’s really interested in checking his oil even if Raven did it yesterday and assured him everything’s alright.

That’s where their healthy competition comes into play – the cars and safety come first. So far, they haven’t had a single serious accident, they don’t earn money except for sporadic bets, and it might seem like they’re all adults playing kids, but.

It’s fun.

It’s honestly so fucking fun and that’s the most appealing thing about what they do. The grins, the offhand comments, the jabs, and the cathartic feeling of losing yourself in the speed. That’s all there is.

“Hey, Blake!”

He’d recognize her voice anywhere and Bellamy’s head snaps up so fast he hits it on the hood.

When he turns around, Clarke is sauntering in his direction, hands shoved into her jacket’s pockets, and smirking at him for a reason he can’t discern. It annoys him that he’s actually a little afraid.

“What do you want, Princess?”

“I thought you might like my jacket.”

“I do not give a shit about – “

The rest of his words die on his lips as she turns, tossing her hair over her shoulder with a wicked grin.

There’s a golden crown cross-stitched on the back of her pink leather jacket and Bellamy wants to die.

“Since you call me Princess and all,” she adds, laughing when Octavia throws her a thumbs up.

It’s Octavia who wins that night, flying past them across the finish line. She gets out of her car, presses a smack to a smiling Raven’s cheek and shouts, “I won, bitches!”

When Bellamy sees that Clarke is beaming, wearing the same pink jacket his sister is now wearing, cocky and self-assured in the mass of the other girls that are now forming a puppy pile on top of Octavia, he’s not sure what he wants to do anymore.

Later that night, they’re at his bar, opening tabs and promising they won’t ditch them, and it’s Clarke who seeks him out when he’s behind the bar, trying to be a responsible businessman instead of someone who’d rather be laughing with his friends.

“I can see who your sister takes after,” she tells him, fingers wrapped around her beer bottle and looking only slightly apprehensive.

Under the dim lights, she looks softer, and all the more powerful for it.

Bellamy chances a smile. “Winning is in our blood.”

“I bet I could beat her, too.”

A beat of silence, even in the loud cacophony of his bar. Octavia is laughing at the corner table, presiding over it with her left leg on the wooden surface and looking like she doesn’t have a care in the world. Tonight, she is victorious.

“But you don’t want to.”

Clarke hums in confirmation, condensation of the bottle sliding down her fingers, dripping onto the bar. She’s not wearing her jacket, just a tank top and a pair of the shortest shorts he’s ever seen.

When she notices him looking, there’s a challenge in her eyes and Bellamy Blake has never been the one to back down from a dare.

“But I could go on another round with you,” she says finally, her keys clattering when she places them between them. Bellamy understands the irony of the gleaming silver keys, but his brain is focused solely on Clarke, the way she bites into her lower lip and he’s no longer sure he’s the only one who doesn’t know what the fuck he’s going to do.

He doesn’t speak and she continues, looking at him through eyes dark with want. It’s always want with them. They want to race, they want to fight, they want to destroy each other just for the kicks.

“And to make it more fun,” God, even the way her mouth curls around the words makes his stomach plummet, “you can have my car. And I’ll take yours.”

Lincoln doesn’t even question Bellamy when he asks him to close up because he’s got something else he needs to take care of.

Clarke laughs like mad all the way to his car, knocking into him. She’s not drunk, hasn’t even had a sip of her beer, she’s just giddy and Bellamy admits to himself how much he likes it.

Her Pontiac feels like her, all that horsepower restrained, bubbling underneath the surface like a well-known fury, smells like her, and he’s in a daze all the way to the racetrack. The neon lights of his city follow him like omens and Bellamy isn’t sure whether they’re good or bad ones.

 

*

 

Clarke puts her jacket on as soon as she’s in Bellamy’s Camaro, something he laughs about when they return to the track and turn off the engines, meeting in front of the hoods.

“Seriously, Princess?”

She hums in confirmation, stepping closer and trailing a hand over the sleek metal of her own car. She likes his Camaro, it feels like a thunderstorm, but her car is being reborn, her car is making the fire her own.

“Did you like driving my car?” he asks, cocky and self-assured in how much it looks like him. And how much she loves just that.

Clarke steps in front of the hood of her Pontiac, feels the sunlight trapped in it radiating warmth. Bellamy’s eyes roam over her body with hunger when she looks up at him.

“Yeah, I did.” Whatever sweetness there was in their interaction, it’s gone as soon as Clarke hears her voice deepening. “I liked driving your car. Just as much as you want _me_ now.”

He smells like gasoline and fighting, with his knuckles white from gripping the hood of her car, searing hot near her thigh. His curls are a hurricane and he’s a force of nature, lips curled into a sneer as he stands in front of her, doubling forward and looking like he wants to double back.

“Who says I even want you, Princess?”

And it’s always that, always that dance that starts with burning rubber and throwing haphazard grins at each other. They’re victors and she might have taken his title of king, had a crown cross-stitched on the back of her jacket, but she always feels like they’re doing it together.

The push and pull, the same she feels in his muscles, taut, as he looks at her like he’s torn between devouring her and absolving her. There is something in it, passion unrestrained, threatening to burn her up – the flames licking at the constellations in his freckles, but every piece of her wants to touch every piece of him.

“I don’t want you either,” she breathes out, feeling frozen as his fingers flex next to her. Closer, closer, she needs them closer. “Fuck you, Bellamy.”

The venom in her voice can’t touch him because he knows her better than this. They don’t hate each other, they _thrive_.

Electricity crackles between them in the air as it shifts, spills over with tension when his pupils widen and he steps closer, pushing her back until the backs of her knees hit her car, sends shivers down the spine.

The racetrack is dark and empty, one single street light making her car look like a pyre in the vast night, when Bellamy kisses her and the flames engulf her.

God, it is everything, the way he tangles a hand in her hair, pulls her closer until she’s flush against his chest. His smirk seeps into her lips, too, but when Clarke moves away there’s no hint of it. Just his lips slightly parted, as if he’s trying to gasp for air but nothing is coming out because they’ve long gone started burning more oxygen to create more force in their engines and now they’re just running on fumes.

“We shouldn’t –“ she starts, but his eyes are dark with want and there is nothing that can stop her. Not anymore. She hates him or she loves him. She wants to tear him apart or she wants to put him together, she wants to set him on fire or create an explosion with him but all she knows is that they’re living in a world of violence and he’s a moment of a stolen away quiet.

Clarke curls her fingers into the front of his shirt, pulls him back, presses her lips to his like she’s fighting him and there’s a second – the top of a rollercoaster, the moment of waiting for the other shoe to drop, the mortality in feeling infinite – in which she waits for him to kiss back.

And then he does. His mouth is wet heat and Bellamy kisses like he breathes, like he drives, like she’s seen him fight Murphy. It’s blood and it’s passion, it’s his teeth biting into her lower lip like he’s not kissing her but destroying her and she buys into it, traces the seam of his lips until he lets her in.

It’s their push and pull. His teeth nearly pierce her skin when he slides his lips to her neck, trails the imaginary line from her jaw to her collarbone, grazing, only to soothe it with his tongue.

“I fucking hate you,” she tells him, just to make sure he knows. He grins in response, mouths ‘princess’ into the crook of her neck, bites hard on it like he’s making a promise.

When his eyes return to hers, his hands now on tops of her thighs, burning through the thin fabric of her jean shorts, they’re full of anger and softness and everything she can’t name because there’s only one thing she recognizes and can return – desire.

Desire that puts her head into a spin, makes her tangle a hand in his curls and pull, hard, enough to make him hiss.

“You’re fucking infuriating,” he shoots back, even though his voice is trembling as his hands cage her in, his body gravitating towards her like their cars always gravitate towards each other. It’s a game of chicken and they’ve gotten good at it.

“You’re even worse.”

“You make me wanna pull my hair out.”

Clarke flashes him a sickly sweet smile she doesn’t know how she’s even able to produce, not with the way every cell of her body feels electrified, begging to come closer to him. “Don’t worry, I can take care of that.”

And Bellamy growls, decision in his eyes never as firm as when he leans forward, flattens her to the hood of her car, her legs instantly opening to invite him between them. He fits, nestling in perfectly close to the apex of her thighs so she can feel just how much he loves this – almost as much as she does.

Because it’d be a lie to say that she doesn’t look forward to his sarcastic remarks every time she gets into her car, every time she accidentally runs a hand down the side of his, pretending to admire it. It’d be a lie because she fucking thrives on every time he calls her princess with mouth full of bravado.

“God, Princess,” he groans, grinding into her and smirking from above when she lets out the tiniest of moans. She doesn’t want to give him the pleasure of knowing what effect he has on her, but.

But it’s so fucking good and she loses all inhibitions, throaty moans when he presses harder, his erection twitching against the denim filling her with ache and emptiness only he can fix.

“I’m gonna fucking ruin you, you know that?”

Clarke hums in confirmation, tugs on his hair harder, laughs when he buries his head in her neck, smelling like whiskey and fuel that sometimes seems necessary to run them – not just their cars. They are one, it seems. And if she’s her Firebird, then he’s his Camaro – more than meets the eye, deadly like a viper.

“I want you to,” she whispers into his ear, wraps her legs around his hips as a final confirmation of just what she wants. “I want you to fucking devastate me because I’m not gonna go easy on you, either.”

Like that’s the only thing he’s ever needed, Bellamy bares his teeth, presses another kiss to her lips, breaks her again, and slides his mouth down her neck, nips on her collarbone, tugs her shirt off and unbuttons her shorts with fingers that have once been covered in car oil but she doesn’t mind.

The world doesn’t seem clear underneath the yellow light, reflecting on his bare shoulders when their clothes have been dropped to the side, but different. Exhaust fumes, the sweltering of heat during the hottest day of the year when sweat clings to their skin and nothing but adrenaline can fix it.

Bellamy chuckles when he slides his fingers between her folds and Clarke’s smile falters, a gasp escaping her mouth. She’s running on fucking heat and he’s just stoking the flame, lingering in places that fill her with ache and want.

“Are you going to give me what I want?” she demands, sounding weak to her own ears. She winds her hands into his hair, pulls hard enough to make him wince but he seems delighted, his gaze on her softer than ever before.

The teasing motions around her entrance don’t stop. If anything – he gets worse, circling right around her clit, alternating pressure so she gets a moment of hope and a moment of knowing that he’s fucking with her.

And then he’s back on top of her, every inch of his skin pressed to every inch of hers.

“Do you have any idea, absolutely any at all,” he growls into the skin of her neck, warm breath, “for how fucking long I’ve wanted to get my hands on you?”

The heat pooling low in her belly turns into a pyre and Clarke can’t even feel an ounce of shame for the rush of wetness his words cause and he can probably feel.

“So do something about it.”

He delivers a stinging slap to her thigh, goosebumps raising in his wake. “Answer me.”

So that’s how it’s gonna be.

Clarke grinds back into his hand and laughs when he lets out a wrecked sound.

“Ever since I wiped the floor with you that first time. Isn’t that right, Bellamy? You just fucking ate me up. Hell, you want to eat me out now.”

Bellamy looks at her and what she sees in his eyes is enough to make all air constrict in her lungs, words die on her lips, because he looks honest, so fucking raw and ruined as he nods. “Yeah. I’ve waited for too fucking long.”

The words are barely out by the time he withdraws his fingers only to push them back in again, finding a spot that finds her uncovering a constellation behind her eyelids and nothing at all, nothing but white hot pleasure in a second that takes him to pull them out.

Then his mouth is wet on hers, stealing a breath from her, burning a trail down her body and settling between her thighs again.

There’s no shame, none at all, because it’s Bellamy and she might hate him six days in a week but there’s this fucking one in which she can’t do anything but collide with him, collide until they’re making enough heat to run their engines.

“Dripping for me, of course.”

“Fuck off.”

He kisses the inside of her thigh before sliding a hand under it, shouldering her leg. “No chance.”

She should feel exposed but she doesn’t. This racetrack is the only place that’s seen her honest. Bellamy’s the only one who’s seen her competitive, when she bares her teeth in a warning, her hand curling around the stick shift and leg pressing on a pedal.

That one sweet moment before the engine starts and sends her flying down the asphalt is how she feels when she feels Bellamy’s hot breath fanning over her heat, pressure coiling in her stomach, and then –

It’s a fucking fuel air explosion in the engine when he finally presses his tongue to her pussy, licking up a hot stripe and growling.

“Damn, I knew you’d taste like heaven.”

“In the middle of the hell, right?” she manages, letting out a small laugh that’s cut short when his teeth find her clit and tug on it, Bellamy shaking his head left and right just a little until she’s twisting and light is exploding behind her eyelids.

He takes her hands from where they’re grabbing at her skin, desperate with her back arched and her throat to the stars, puts them on his hair. “Here.”

She’d laugh if she had any strength to but there is nothing because Bellamy is working her up just like he works his car up; pushing until she gives in, lets out a cry that nearly pierces her own eardrums and does whatever the fuck he wants.

He’s in control and Clarke comes off her high, shaking just a little with his lips trailing up her stomach, hands warm on her sides. She’s expecting him to smirk but he looks worse than she feels; like this is too much, like they’ve crossed a line in there somewhere and now they don’t know how to go back.

“Clarke,” he gasps, voice strangled, just this one quiet thing in all of this violence of internal combustion.

 _I know_ , she wants to say, carding her fingers through his hair when he’s looking her in the eye again, his cock pressing to her entrance, his muscles rippling as he hovers above her. _I know how it feels because I want you to wreck me, too._

She wants to break him and tear him to pieces but all she does is move forward, spread her legs wider and wind them around his hips again, where they fit. It’s a moment that feels too blissful for who they are, when he presses in after what feels like ages of just having to look him in the eye and stare down that uncontained fury and passion and sadness and everything she could’ve hinted at but never knew.

It’s too deep for who they are to each other but maybe the rules never worked for them.

He whispers profanities into her ear as she urges him to go harder by digging her fingers into his ass, muscles hard wherever she runs her hands. There’s sweat dripping down his brow and she doesn’t know why she wants to taste him, all of a sudden, but he’s salty and sweet and she bites into his neck with the taste of him still caught on her tongue.

God, that’s all they are – sweat and gasoline and the moment adrenaline kickstarts your heart.

He’s going to ruin her and she’s going to ruin him. Both of them know it, but when his thumb starts rubbing tight circles on her clit and he laughs a little, saying, “Come on, together.” Clarke can’t do anything but smile back.

See, both of them know they’re going to get ruined.

But both of them want it like fucking air.

 

*

 

Bellamy wins the next time and Clarke smirks after she blows him in his Camaro. He pulls her up, glassy eyes and sloppy mouths, and she leans into his touch in the front seat of his car.

“Fuck it,” he growls before deepening the kiss, feeling the taste of him and her mix on her tongue. She’s going to be the death of him and he doesn’t regret a single thing. “Fuck it, you won.”

Clarke bites on his lower lip, but pain almost feels like a safe haven at this point. “Do you give up?”

“Yes, fuck, Clarke, I do.”

A week later, it’s her who strides out of her car, queen victorious, and comes apart on his fingers in the backseat of her Pontiac, Bellamy hovering above her with a smirk plastered on his face, widening every time she digs her fingernails deeper into his back.

“Who’s the king?” he asks, voice like heat, sticking to her skin, seeping into her every pore, burrowing itself somewhere in her ribs.

She doesn’t reply and Bellamy sucks on her pulse point, thumb skimming over her clit.

“You are.”

“I didn’t catch that. What did you say?”

“You are.”

“I am what?”

Clarke rolls her eyes but his fingers are long and when he crooks them, she arches her back, reveling in the way he hits his head on the roof of her car.

Well, nearly reveling because she’s so close and then he cuts her off, removes his fingers and sucks them into his mouth, one by one, letting out moans that could have her coming in a second.

“You are the king, Bellamy. You are.”

She doesn’t even feel like winning when he kisses her again, resuming his ministrations and makes her see the stars when there were none before.

And so it goes.

 

*

 

Some nights, their blood is slower and they don’t chase each other with the same fervor. Some nights, Clarke lives for the moment everyone leaves and she gets into the Camaro, breathes in the smell of him, lets him take them wherever the hell he wants to.

Those nights, time stops as they drive under a starlit sky. There are fields, there are deserts, there are plains, but they stay on the road. They stay on the road because it’s the one thing they have, even when they want to rip each other to shreds to prove that they are worthy.

It’s then that Clarke learns more about him, how his mother died when he was nineteen and how there were days when he sat in his bathroom, trying to find a common ground between anger and sadness – both of which wanted him to destroy himself and everyone else around him.

He tells her the story of his life with his left hand on the wheel, even when the engine has long been turned off, and with his right in hers. He never looks at her. Instead, he looks at the speedometer, like it’s going to give him answers.

He looks at the stars but they’re not a comfort.

Then, and only then, does he look at her, choking on the words that all sound the same – it’s always either _mom_ or _Octavia_ or _fuck_ , bitterly spoken – and she’s already looking at him.

He doesn’t want to ruin her anymore and it scares the hell out of him.

So he kisses her, slides his hands into her hair, unwinds the curls made by the heat and the summer, getting under their skin like they do to each other. Her mouth is wet and wanting but her shoulders scream weight he knows intimately.

The road is always good to them, even when they aren’t good to themselves.

Clarke wrings her hands in her lap, frowns at them when she thinks he’s not looking.

“Hey,” he reminds her gently, forgetting that they can’t be gentle with each other – no, they are tough, they have to be willing to bare their fangs every step of the way.

But at the end of the day, she mutters a “Sorry” and smiles at him like she thinks she’s fooling someone.

She’s not.

But he lets her anyway.

A second later, her feet are propped up on his dash, a teasing smile playing on her mouth as she leans her arm on his seat, tangles her fingers into his hair and tugs a little until she gets a chuckle out of him.

“That’s better. I like you more when you’re smiling.” There’s honesty in her words, that sort that makes Bellamy’s heart flip, and he doesn’t know how they got here.

All he knows is that, in one moment, she was writhing on the hood of her cherry red car, rocking up against his mouth, and in the other, it felt like all the rules to the game have changed.

He doesn’t mind. When she laughs, she laughs like it honest to God surprises her that she can, and he unwraps her, bit by bit.

They still try to beat each other in every race, but it’s different. It’s more relaxed, playful, teasing that’s only going to lead to something good, instead of trying to claw each other apart.

“I’m gonna fuck you up, Blake!” she screams across the track, striding towards him and Bellamy laughs even when Raven looks at him like he’s gone completely insane.

“I’d love to see you try, Princess!”

One night (after she won), they sit below the stands, wine coolers by their ankles and he traces the pattern of the crown embroidered into her jacket.

“It’s summer. Why the hell do you wear these jackets?” he asks, poking at a strip of leather. Clarke’s dropped her jacket to the ground before she sat down but he didn’t want to see it getting dirty. There’s something about it that’s so inherently Clarke; yellow crown, pink and screaming of that quiet sort of danger. That sort you never know it’s there until it maims you.

But Clarke seems like her vibrant laughter, too, and blue eyes that can turn from clear skies to thunderstorms as fast as her car can get from 0 to 60.

“We’re sacrificing bodily comfort for the aesthetic,” she replies, rolling her eyes and taking a sip out of her bottle. Bellamy laughs and she pokes him in the ribs. “You’d stop being so fucking grumpy if you wore a pink jacket, too.”

“Maybe I’ll get Raven to make me one.”

Clarke raises an eyebrow. “I bet you’d look good in pink.”

“I look good in everything, Princess.”

In late August, the stars are bright in the sky above them, cicadas louder than their thoughts, and Clarke rests her head on his shoulder when they’re sitting in the dust next to her car. They do this, they run away. They do it together.

“When I’m driving, it’s like everything goes quiet. There’s just this calm in my head and, Bellamy,” she looks at him, eyes wide, hopeful and devastated at the same time as a bitter little smile plays on her lips, “nothing else matters. It’s like all this violence – because it’s violent, isn’t it – just brings calm.”

“I know.”

And he does.

 

*

 

The first time she sleeps over and wakes up in his shirt, Bellamy’s heart beats out a victory march. She laughs, loud, like she’s gonna stop wars with that laugh, and he falls for her deeper.

Actually, he knows he is in love with her as soon as he arrives to the kitchen, eyes heavy with sleep and stomach twisting because the bed was cold on her side and he couldn’t get himself to admit that he wanted her to stay.

Then he sees her puttering around the coffee maker, wearing nothing but his blue T-shirt, humming along to the radio, a strand of golden hair falling in her eyes and when she huffs, annoyed, he knows it.

He knows it like an absolute truth that sends his head spinning in a daze.

Clarke turns around, then, standing on the tips of her toes, and sends him a puzzled look.

“What are you looking at?”

Bellamy shakes his head, closes what little distance there is between them, and kisses her. There’s bitter taste of coffee on her tongue when she deepens the kiss and his t-shirt slips off her shoulder, uncovers a strip of skin he can’t help but to stare at in awe.

“You look good in my shirt,” he tells her, pecks her forehead. “I could get used to it.”

And then she beams at him, all blue eyes and a brilliant smile he loves seeing so much. Yes, he loves the crooked smile, challenging smirks, but he loves this one the most.

It makes him feel like he’s, for the first time in his life, enough to deserve something good. But it’s even more than that, it’s Clarke. It’s the princess who kicked his ass and now really wants to be sitting here, looks like she belongs here even more than he does.

 “You’d better,” she replies, eyes full of mirth, that smile that somehow never quite reached her eyes turning into a roman candle that illuminates in his shoebox apartment. „I'm staying.“

In his small kitchen, with the smell of coffee and early morning light filtering in through the window, Bellamy uncovers a small universe.

 

*

 

Clarke is not good at this, she knows when Bellamy drops a hand in her lap as they drive towards one place or the other. It’s searing hot on her thigh and she takes it in his, traces the white line of the scar he’s got in the middle of his palm.

He has a lot of scars, she’s realized. There’s one above his upper lip, one on his shoulder, this one on his palm and probably a lot more she has yet to see. But she wants to, and she hasn’t seen a scar of his that she didn’t want to kiss.

But she’s afraid – of course she is. Everyone always leaves or gets taken away from her. They break her heart in the end, all of them. Her dad died because she was young, the road was slippery and she lost control of the car. Wells died because he was born into money, hated for who his parents were. Finn used her to escape. Lexa left because Clarke was not enough.

Clarke is a living collection of souvenirs; she is her father’s watch she never takes off, her mother’s ambition, and some days it feels like the expanse of her skin is mapped with other people’s posting stamps.

She gets bits, she never gets the whole.

And then there is Bellamy, a smile curling the corners of his lips upwards, bright eyes in dead darkness, unruly curls – a paradox of chaos in his soul and the calm he brings to her.

She wants to be better when she’s with him, better than just giving him pieces of her. He makes her feel whole, he should get to see it all.

But she’s still young and she’s still afraid, so she just squeezes his hand tight and starts talking.

“Has Raven told you how we met?”

Bellamy shakes his head and Clarke chuckles, holds onto his hand tighter. It should be a funny story, but it only contains heartbreak.

“I was dating Finn.” Bellamy’s eyes flick towards her, knitted brows. “At the same time she was. I didn’t know about her and she didn’t know about me. Then, one night, I just saw the two of them, walking down the street, holding hands and I could tell that there was love there. There wasn’t love in anything Finn and _I_ did.”

“Clarke-“

Bellamy’s gaze on her is soft before he pulls to the side, turns off the engine and shifts so he can look her in the eye. “You don’t have to do this.”

“I want to.” He holds her gaze for a second longer, then shrugs and settles in. “Well, I told Finn what I saw and he kept apologizing, but. He was in love with the idea of me, you know? With the idea that I’m someone other than Raven, that was enough for him, because he’s been with her all his life and he needed to escape.”

A car passes them, bright yellow lights illuminating the back of Bellamy’s head until it looks like his hair is on fire.

“I thought I was the one who always wanted to escape,” she mutters darkly, feeling the familiar stinging in the back of her throat that alerts her to tears threatening to spill any moment now. This time, she doesn’t mind. It’s Bellamy. “And then there I was, being someone else’s exit sign.”

Bellamy rubs imaginary patterns into the skin of her knuckles, keeps looking at her soft and sad. She probably doesn’t deserve him. It feels like she’s still paying off some old debts.

“Well, Raven and I slashed his tires and stayed friends. The whole thing was ridiculous so we figured, why the hell shouldn’t we?”

Bellamy snorts. “Yeah, that sounds like you and Raven alright.”

“I’m glad I met her, even if everything else was shit. I’m glad I met _you_.”

But she has more to say, more to confess in the darkness of the car. It feels like the only time she can be honest with anyone. Some days, she can’t even be honest with herself.

“Then I met Lexa, who loved me until I had nothing more to give. She couldn’t understand why I wanted to paint when I could have been a doctor. I just wasn’t enough.” Clarke takes a deep breath, swats at the tears pooling in her eyes and blurring Bellamy. “I think I’m still paying off killing my dad and getting Wells in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

He never would’ve been in that alleyway if it weren’t for her.

Her dad would’ve been here if she hadn’t insisted on driving home that night.

It’s her fault and nothing Bellamy says will change that, but at least he understands. At least he knows the taste of guilt, staining everything with its bitterness.

Even his voice is stained with it. “It’s not your fault, Clarke.” And she scoffs, feels him chuckle. “Yeah, I know. I know it’s not that easy.”

He can’t save her and she can’t save him but maybe – just maybe – maybe they can save each other.

“If I give you my forgiveness, will you give me yours? Maybe that’s – “

Bellamy turns to look at her, long, deep, enough to read everything written in every inch of her skin. They’ve built their lives on wrong foundations, they’re destined to crumble, but when he smiles at her, like his whole life is the longest day and she’s the home he finally gets to come to, Clarke hopes.

“Yeah,” he replies, a hand resting on the back of her head, coming closer to her. There’s understanding in his eyes. “Yeah, yeah, I’d love that.”

“You’re forgiven, then, Bellamy.”

He waits until his lips are hovering over hers, close enough to touch, far enough to pull away and never return. His breath is warm on her face when he whispers, “You’re forgiven, too, Clarke.”

All the weight she’s been holding on her shoulders rolls away and Clarke swears she hears something break, something very loud, something very quiet, something so, so close.

When he kisses her, she knows that he’s not a savior, but he shows her salvation anyways.

 

*

 

It all comes crashing down in a night like any other, air vibrating with nervous excitement as everyone gathers around for another race. Raven is joking around with Harper, Lincoln’s arms are wrapped around Octavia’s waist and Monty kisses Miller’s helmet for good luck.

“Where’s Clarke?” Bellamy catches himself asking, realizing in that moment that he doesn’t even know her last name. It doesn’t seem so significant, when he knows all the things she blames herself for.

It’s Octavia who replies. “She had other stuff to do. Said I could drive her car.”

She’s smiling so brightly that Bellamy doesn’t have the heart to tell her that she shouldn’t be doing it. It’s always dangerous, she doesn’t know how the Pontiac reacts, but.

He’s disappointed her enough.

It isn’t until they set off at the starting line, everything going well for the first few minutes, that he realizes something is wrong.

The Pontiac starts skidding suddenly, dark liquid leaving a trail after it and Bellamy is hitting the brakes so hard he swears he’s going to wreck the car and himself, too.

They’re approaching a corner but Octavia isn’t taking a turn, the wheels aren’t moving – they’re facing forward and heading towards the concrete wall, illuminated by the car’s headlights.

Bellamy watches it happen, unable to do anything but keep pressing the brakes as they wail in riot, as the front of the Pontiac crashes into the wall with a sound of metal shattering and his heart stops.

Octavia’s head is lolling on her shoulders, eyelids heavy, and he barely manages to get her out onto the sizzling pavement. The Pontiac looks like a forest fire that’s going to engulf them whole, without even a hint of fire anywhere.

“O – fuck, Octavia, don’t fall asleep, listen to me,” he begs, hoping that God or the universe or whatever that is out there and has turned a blind eye on his life is listening now. Now when he needs a miracle because his sister’s face has gone ashen.

Miller’s at his side soon enough, Raven slaps Octavia gently and gets her to opens her eyes again. Everyone helps get her into Monty’s car because it’s the safest one and the speed now tastes like shit.

It has given them so much but Bellamy won’t let it take the one good thing in his life away.

“Bellamy, Bellamy, she’s going to be alright.” Raven pulls on his sleeve when the doctors roll her away on a stretcher, one hand drooping lifelessly from the green surface.

Lincoln is standing next to him and Bellamy isn’t aware of his own tears until he sees the same ones rolling down the other man’s cheeks.

“How could you, Raven?” he finally asks, shouts it into the hallway, into the universe, not giving a fuck that doctors are shooting glares his way. “How could you let her drive Clarke’s car?”

Raven doesn’t even look like she’s going to fight him on it, devastated.

“I checked it. Bellamy, I fucking checked everything and I don’t – “

“Where’s Clarke?”

Raven blinks at him.

“I’m not gonna ask again, Raven. Where’s Clarke?”

Because it’s Clarke’s fault. It’s her fucking fault for letting this happen in the first place. It’s all of their fault but it’s Bellamy’s fault the most. Octavia is his sister, his responsibility. He was supposed to know better than to let her drive some spoiled princess’ car.

“I don’t know,” she admits, frowning at the cracked tile in front of her combat boots.

They’re not victorious, Bellamy knows now. They’re just fucking losers. And you can call loss a victory, but it’s always going to stay a loss.

“Where does she live?”

Raven looks like she’s battling herself for a moment, but caves, rattling off the address at the top of her head. Bellamy scoffs as soon as she’s done because of course she’d be rich, living in a neighborhood full of people like her.

“You never should’ve brought her.”

Lincoln’s hand on his shoulder is heavy, but there’s nothing that can stop Bellamy. “It’s not her – “

“Don’t tell me it’s not the Princess’ fault because if you do, I’ll fucking kill you! Octavia is _my_ sister, she’s _my_ responsibility! It’s my fault, but the Princess had her own share, too!”

There are five different ways his drive to Clarke’s place could go wrong because he runs all the red lights, narrowly avoids a crash just as he’s entering her street, but he’s been doing this for ages – he’s going to make it. Just one more lap, just one more minute until he’s pulling up to a building made out of glass and concrete, a modern tower for a modern princess.

The doorman asks him where he’s heading to but he brushes him off, walks all the way up to the third floor and pounds on the door bearing a plate with what must be her name on it – Clarke _Griffin_ \- because he wants to ruin something, if he’s not brave enough to ruin himself.

The door opens of its own accord, no one on the other side, and Bellamy marches into the darkness of the apartment he can already see is four times the size of his crappy shoebox.

It was all a fucking sham and he could laugh, if he wasn’t feeling so goddamn angry, like every inch of his skin is vibrating with it. He still smells like gasoline but now he hates it.

Now he hates Clarke, too, and he’s going to wait for as long as it takes.

He goes in deeper, finding what must be the living room, illuminated by the lights of the city streaming in through huge windows, a picture of royal perfection.

“Bellamy, what – “

He’s barely noticed her, standing by this gigantic window, and once he does – he can’t stop looking. It takes him a moment to realize that it’s not her skin that’s shining, but the sparkles woven in her dress, like shimmering scales in the dimmed light, diamonds in her ears, every inch of her skin polished into a blank, perfect slate.

The ticking time bomb in his stomach starts the countdown.

“What are you doing here?” she asks, voice raspy.

She looks like marble and steel and this time, he does laugh.

Because she is a princess, cold and distant, like marble statues he used to admire when he was young and believed he could study history and travel across the world, become something more than this ruin of a man who owns a bar and drives a fast car because it’s the best he can do to comfort himself.

She is Persephone, standing with her chin raised petulantly, getting ready to rule the Underworld.

She is Athena, hair pulled up in a sleek updo, eyes declaring a war.

She is a queen and his life seems like a charade, now. She never needed to win because she’s won just by being born.

Bellamy laughs and laughs, laughs at himself, laughs at her for fooling him – wants to congratulate her because she sounded so honest, sitting on her folded jacket in the desert, leaning on his car and staring at the stars like she badly wanted to escape.

And she did. She was escaping with every kiss they shared, every whisper and every lie.

“You’re a fucking comedy, Clarke,” he tells her, in between fits of laughter, knows that he’s hurt her when her arms come up to wrap around her sides.

He used to think she understood him when she did that; all that weight she’s been carrying.

Now he knows better.

“Octavia had an accident, driving your car.”

Her face falls, shoulders slump. But she stays quiet.

“It’s a game to you, I can see that,” he gestures towards her apartment vaguely, glass and polish and so clean where he’s car oil and spilled beer and a frightening lack of manners.

He could’ve never had her.

“It’s not – “ she starts, but lets him cut her off, curls up inside a little more. Her dress is worth more than his car.

“Do you know what you are, Clarke? You are a joke. You strode in like you owned the place, got yourself a nice car and went for the crown just because you wanted it. People like you – you always get what you want.”

A shadow crosses her face but she doesn’t move. Bellamy’s blood boils in his veins, searing hot, burning everything in its wake.

“Well, I guess you got what you wanted. You got me, you got Raven, you got Octavia, you got yourself a nice little secret life that’s gonna give you your daily adrenaline kick when mommy goes too rough on you for not spending enough money.”

She is the marble statue.

She is not the blonde beauty in a red car whose laugh could make wars – and his heart – stop.

“Bellamy, I can explain – “

He grins at her, no mirth to it, and sees her recoil. “No need. I can see what your explanation is. Just tell me, was it a ball? And did they smell gasoline all – over – you?”

Clarke unwraps her hands, balls them into fists, steps closer. Her high heels sound like power on the hardwood floor.

“I am sorry about Octavia, but if you’d just let me explain, then you’d understand! I care about you and Octavia, I’m in love with you! How can you be so fucking blind to it, after everything?”

Bellamy shakes his head, moves away. She’s not his. She never was his. And he never was hers.

And then, like a final punch,

“You never even told me your surname.”

Breath catches in her throat and he is almost calm as he watches it dawn on her.

“Yeah, Clarke. Griffin. Saw that on the door. You sure as hell didn’t tell me. What else did you lie about?”

Her jaw is locked but her voice is croaky, all wrong, and he knows that tears are at bay. “I never lied, Bellamy. How can you –“

“Please, excuse me, Your Highness,” his voice drips with venom, enough to poison both of them. “I misspoke. What else did you _omit_?”

“I didn’t do it on purpose!”

After all this time, she can’t stop lying.

It’s all the same, Bellamy supposes. She doesn’t owe him shit, he was just a toy to have a really good time with. For a while. He’s not even good for permanent use.

“You still don’t see it, do you? You’ve been stuck in your ivory tower for too long to notice that this isn’t a game. People aren’t toys, Princess. Octavia could’ve died tonight because you were whisked off to a ball, probably feeling sorry for yourself.” He almost stops himself but chooses against it. “You disgust me. You are nothing but a rich, self-entitled bastard who ruins lives for fun. That’s who you are. That’s who you’ve always been.”

He walks out the door and swears he hears her choke on a sob.

This time, he doesn’t look back.

 

*

 

After that, it’s blood on the racetrack.

Bellamy keeps coming because now, more than ever, he wants to see her choke on the dust she used to rise. His disgust is clear in the way he looks at her.

And Clarke keeps coming because she is angry, too.

She is angry that he wouldn’t listen. She is angry that he blames her when he wants to blame himself, and when no one but their fucking luck should be blamed.

Octavia is the one to approach her after a race, her arm in a cast, but her smile is still brilliant and she still looks like she could move mountains with one toss of her hair.

“I don’t blame you,” she tells her, simple as that. It has never struck Clarke how much she looks like Bellamy – her skin is lighter, but they’ve got matching sets of jawlines that could cut glass and stubborn stares.

It almost feels as good as talking to Bellamy.

“I’m sorry that happened, Octavia. If I had known – “

The other girl stops her with a gentle press of her healthy hand to Clarke’s forearm. It almost feels good, to be touched, like it felt good when Bellamy calmed her trembling hands with his fingers, calmed her heavy heart in her chest with a smile.

And there’s a thought that makes her want to cry.

“But you didn’t, okay? No use blaming yourself for things that are not your fault.”

“Yeah, okay.”

“Bellamy will come around. Just give him time, okay?”

But he’s further away every time he looks at her and the nickname that used to be a joke now drips with poison. She hasn’t seen that much hate in his stare ever since that first race, and even then it was just a game.

Clarke tries to forget all about it, surrounded by her girls. Octavia can’t drive but she spends her afternoons in Raven’s garage anyways, feet propped up on the worktable and laughing whenever Raven scolds her.

The Pontiac feels like a stranger when Clarke drives it these days. The girls laugh and sing along to the songs on the radio, Raven’s fingers are quick when the volume needs to be turned up and Harper’s smile is still as bright, but Clarke doesn’t feel it like second skin anymore. It betrayed her, in a way, and nothing that Octavia says won’t erase the feeling of guilt that’s burrowed in her chest, right in the void Bellamy left when he called her a joke, when he called her all those things Clarke knew she looked like – a princess, a snob, someone who is rich and nothing else.

The worst thing is – she thought he saw more. She saw herself through his eyes, a mosaic compiled of loud laughs, heads thrown back, wild and frizzy blonde hair, tiny moments of tenderness that seemed so impossible after a race.

She saw herself through his eyes and she liked what she saw there.

“Stop being a wet fucking blanket, Griffin,” Raven pokes her in the shoulder, her feet on Clarke’s dash. There’s no one Clarke would like there more, except maybe Bellamy, who used to sit in Raven’s seat and look at her like he’s not even expecting her to return the gaze. Like he just wanted to.

“Sorry, Rae, I’ll – “

“It’s about that asshole again, right?” Raven asks and huffs, annoyed. “Look, Clarke, that’s Bellamy. You know he’s protective over Octavia and has a chip the size of Alaska on his shoulder. He’ll – “

“Come around, I know.” Clarke bites into her lower lip, tastes blood. The city lights cut across her hands on the wheel, make them look red for a split second. “But he said these things and – he was right, Raven. In a way.”

He didn’t know why she had to bail on the race that got Octavia injured. He didn’t know that her mother had called and Clarke was desperate to reconcile with her; the only remaining person in this world that shares the same blood coursing through their veins. The one person who could dispel her worries as soon as they popped up, when she was a kid. There’s no one else who Clarke would bail on a race for.

But Bellamy wouldn’t listen and now Clarke is left with her heart clenching, equal parts pain and anger, all those unsaid words she needed him to hear itching at her lips when he’s near.

Raven is blue when Clarke looks at her and she’s staring at the road ahead of them.

“So make him listen to what you’ve got to say. Make him, because this is Bellamy. If anyone can see straight through his bullshit and call him out on it, it’s you.”

When they make it to the track, the car’s engine choking because it’s stronger now, thanks to Raven being a miracle worker, Octavia and Bellamy are fighting about something, everyone else having migrated to the other side to give them some room.

When Clarke exits the car, it’s like nothing happened at all, except for the way Bellamy glares at her, arms crossed and just fucking daring her to say something.

She doesn’t.

“Who’s driving tonight?” Miller asks, counting the hands that shoot up in the air after. Jasper’s laughing with Monty by his orange Nissan, Harper is petting Monroe’s hair a little dazedly and Bellamy is still staring at Clarke, still looking he wants to kill her.

“Alright, get in line. Monroe, you and your girlfriend just about ready?”

“I don’t know, Nate, how about you and Monty?”

“Shut the fuck up, _Zoe_ ,” Miller grumbles, making everyone else erupt in laughter. Even Clarke laughs, knocking against Raven with the force of it.

You don’t call Miller by his first name.

And you definitely don’t call Monroe by her first name, either.

They’re in their cars and Clarke’s almost forgotten about Bellamy, if that was even possible with how deliberate his presence seems to be, when he struts over.

“I don’t care why you couldn’t make it to the race,” he tells her, quick and clipped, his face blank and giving nothing away. She preferred the anger.

“Of course you don’t, Blake. You don’t care about whatever anyone else has to say. All it matters is what you think.”

The loaded silence stretches between them, as dangerous as the electricity crackling in the air.

And then –

“I hope your fucking engine explodes,” Bellamy hisses.

“Well, I hope you drown in your own bullshit.”

 

Clarke throws herself into her car, slams the door behind and revs up the engine until it’s the only thing audible on the racetrack. No one dares to approach her, they just quietly shuffle into their own cars or to the sides.

The world is red again, like it used to be when Blake would wind her up and she drove to win.

Now she’s driving to fucking ruin him and when Raven gives the signal, they’re off with a thunderous sound. There is too much horsepower on the track, but Clarke could kiss Raven for her magic.

The engine keeps combusting, more and more, louder and louder, and soon enough, she’s the one at the head of the crowd, leaving Bellamy’s blue Camaro behind, leaving Monroe’s Corvette in the dust, no one in the world except for Clarke and her anger.

It’s good until it isn’t, until flashing signs on the instrument panel alert her to something going wrong and the engine lets out a screech that freezes the blood in her veins. Raven knows what she’s doing, she does, but the engine sounds off and Clarke looks around in a daze.

The first thing she sees is smoke, thick and dark, erupting from the engine and Clarke hits the breaks. There is terror where there used to be peace, now, and everything is clouded in black mist.

She must’ve been too late because the next thing she is aware of is a crash, the sound of metal screeching as the car hits the concrete bank at full speed good for racing, but bad for a corner she couldn’t cut.

Her engine keeps combusting, like it’s actually going to burn up all that extra oxygen, but the car is airborne, twisting sickly on its side and clattering to the ground with a thunderous sound of glass shattering, tires squealing and Clarke screaming before she even knows she’s doing it.

It’s happening and it’s not happening, at the same time, like the world in front of her is distorted, a collection of senses and feelings. Sharp pain in her left hand, the crunching of bones she hears in the distance but recognizes as close, wet and warm liquid trickling down her temple.

When she raises a hand to touch it and brings it back in front of her eyes, her fingertips are red and she’s only half-aware that it’s her own blood, every inch of her skin flaring in pain.

“Clarke!”

Her seatbelt is pressing on her lungs, making it hard for her to breathe, and it’s so funny – how everything started hurting in just a second, how the whole world – not only her car – got turned on its side.

“She wrecked her engine!”

Oh. So that must be it. Raven told her that the other word for it is ‘grenade’. Clarke grenaded her engine. That’s funny.

Everything smells a bit like rust, until she senses fuel in the air, too. She’s always liked the smell. There was something comforting about it, like there’s a parallel universe trapped in it. A little danger. A little freedom.

“We need to get her out of there!”

“Her fucking engine’s caught on fire!”

Her friends’ voices are drifting through the haze and Clarke supposes that they’ve got to be talking about her but her head is pounding and sleep sounds really, really good. If she falls asleep, she’ll wake up and it’s going to be alright.

Yeah, sleep sounds like a good idea.

Something’s warming up her toes now, licking at the soles of her shoes and she recognizes it as a small fire. It’s alright. She’s in her car, she can’t be touched.

“No – no – you can’t go, it’s going to explode!”

“Move the fuck away, someone needs to get her out of there!”

Bellamy told her that he hoped her engine would explode and Clarke thinks in passing how ironic that is. Now he’s the one who wants to get her out. That’s really funny, and she’d tell him just that but it’s getting really warm and her bones ache for a rest.

 

*

 

Bellamy watches the sparks erupt from underneath the Pontiac’s hood, stuck in a daze. The whole scene seems ridiculous, like tragedies always do. There is something so simple about seeing them that always makes him want to laugh, because – they bring so much pain, so how can they seem so simple, so quick?

In one second, Clarke’s car was skidding and in the other, the red beast was turned on its side. And the only thing Bellamy could think about was how he’d told her that he hoped her engine would explode.

It has got to be him, Bellamy and his tendency to rain destruction upon people he cares about. He was always tough with Octavia and then she had a car accident. He wanted to hate Clarke so much that he actually spent time trying to think of something that would hurt her the most.

And, in the end, the universe itself was enough to bring enough bad luck upon all of them. It didn’t even need him.

“Her fucking engine’s caught on fire!” Monroe shouts, stepping forward before Miller pulls her back. They watch it unfold in front of their eyes, what little fuel trickled out now idling as the sparks threaten to set the car ablaze.

And it’s Clarke in there. It’s Clarke in there, whose eyes burned with enough fire to turn this car into pyre now, every time she looked at him. Of course he hurt her, of course – he _wanted_ to. Because that’s what he does. Because he’s a ruin and he’s chaos, he’s no good for anything, but he liked to pretend that he could be better than what was given to him.

He was given these two hands to slam them on the hoods of cars and bunch his fingers into fists, he was given this brain to come up with enough hurtful things to ruin every good thing he’s ever had, and he was given those little moments of happiness just so he could never forget how angry it made him to lose them.

Every second he spent thinking that she might want him, sitting in his kitchen with her legs crossed and fingers wrapped around a cup of steaming coffee, carding her fingers through his hair and holding him close like she needs him, too – every second was wasted, every second burns at his insides now.

Everything burns at him now.

But he’s not going to let Clarke burn.

She deserves better.

Miller tries to stop him, strong hands on his chest, but he rips away like he always does – this time, maybe, he can do some good with this force that’s been given to him to unleash it on the world.

“No – no – you can’t go, it’s going to explode!”

“Move the fuck away, someone needs to get her out of there!”

_And it has to be me because it’s my fault she’s there in the first place._

The car smells like impending destruction and he grabs at Clarke’s hand, freezes when he sees all the blood that’s trickling into her eyes, into her hair, soaking her clothes through and through. Her eyes are half-closed, looking so much like Octavia, except more violent.

There are quiet tragedies and then there are violent ones.

He’s seen both.

And they’ve all broken his heart. But this one is going to kill him.

“Clarke,” he calls for her, pulls at her seatbelt, half in the car. She smiles at him little weakly, more unconscious than conscious.

Her eyes are glassy and it scares the shit out of him when she slurs, “That’s really funny.”

“What is?” No reply, she’s looking somewhere above his shoulder as he gets the switchblade Raven got him out of his jacket. He swears to God he’s going to set the whole world on fire if he doesn’t manage to cut through her seatbelt in time. He has to. “Huh, what’s so funny, Princess?”

Clarke lets out a little cough, all that smoke bringing tears to his eyes as he pulls on the belt, feels it give a little, keeps slashing through the threads. Fire singes at his arm as he works, all that warmth he used to find comforting.

“You. Hoping my engine’s going to explode. Funny.”

His stomach plummets, his heart breaks and he’s wondering how any of them are even standing anymore. How is the fight still alive, even after they’ve been reduced to embers?

He laughs through tears because he doesn’t know what the fuck to do anymore with his bad luck pouring out onto the other people and Clarke laughs, too, because she knows she’s going to die and maybe neither one of them ever gave a fuck about that.

Hell, they knew what would happen. And even if they died, they’d die free.

“I’m so sorry,” he breathes out, another thread of her seatbelt snaps. The air reeks of fuel even more and he swears he’s never going to forget the taste of it. “I’m so sorry, Clarke.”

_I’m so sorry for this. I’m so sorry for wanting to pull you apart just because I couldn’t piece myself together._

Her eyes are glassy but she has this little smile tugging on her mouth, a little bitter, too happy for the last seconds before they catch on fire, and she knows just what he wants to say. “It’s alright. Get out of here.”

His thumb skims over the edge of the blade and he finally pulls the seatbelt loose, Clarke’s head thudding against the pavement again, but she doesn’t look bothered. Just very tired, and he feels it in his bones, too.

“I’m getting you out.”

“There’s no time. Go, Bellamy, just – “

He feels someone’s hands at his waist and he wants to laugh when he sees that it’s Miller because Miller’s got something to live for, and maybe Bellamy has too but Octavia will be even better off without him.

Clarke’s accident is his fault and he knows it. If he hadn’t said that he hoped her engine would explode, this wouldn’t have happened.

“Come on, man, let’s go, we haven’t got time,” Miller shouts, pulls at him as Bellamy tugs on Clarke’s arm, laughing and laughing until they’re out of the car, more smoke than air, and his face on the searing hot asphalt.

She drifts in and out of consciousness as Bellamy scoops her up, the sound of sirens in the air like the day Octavia got hurt. This time, there’s explosions and fire and screams that are only inside his head, but they’re still.

They watch Clarke’s Pontiac burn down and she doesn’t bat an eyelid.

There are Raven and Octavia and Monty next to them, now, everyone looking at Bellamy sitting with Clarke in his lap in the middle of the road, cars everywhere and one burning up in the distance, combusting a little more with each passing second.

The voices never stop, the sirens get louder, and the world is a menace trying to pierce his eardrums when he gets into the ambulance with Clarke. The world is radio silence and atomic bombs dropping everywhere around him, but he holds her hand and she grips his like a lifeline, her eyes never leaving his.

“You’re going to be fine, Clarke,” he assures her, caressing her hand with his thumb, stroking her hair, the EMTs checking the monitors letting out little beeps. “It’s going to be alright.

But she’s looking at him and she’s alive, both of them are. Her hair is charred at ends, her cheeks are grey from the smoke but she is _alive_.

They’re never going to be fucking alright and they’re never going to forget seconds ticking away in their minds, flames licking at their skin, the speed and the gasoline – creation and destruction.

But she’s holding his hand and there’s something like fight in her tired eyes, now. Just a little spark, just enough to light a flame. This one might not want to burn them alive. This one might be happier.

“Yeah, I know,” she whispers, nuzzling her cheek into his hand when he traces imaginary patterns into the dust. “You’re here now.”

The world turns to nothing because Clarke is everything.

And she’s worth fighting for.

 

**Author's Note:**

> That's that. I hope you stuck by me till the end, and thank you so much, if you did. I struggled with this fic but, ultimately, I love cars, I love Bellarke, I love Nat who has supplied me with incredible music that helped me write this and I love all of you, who took the time to read it.
> 
> If you liked it, it would mean the world to me if you let me know. **Kudos & comments** are a great way to do that.
> 
> Also - damn Lana, back at it with the edits, but, you know. I made an edit and you can check it out here, in my [trash can](http://marauders-groupie.tumblr.com/post/140172576792).


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